The Brewers are discu sing right-hander in trades with multiple clubs, per . With the non-tender deadline coming up at 7 pm Central tonight, its po sible the club is looking to make a move before committing to Woodruff for the 2024 season. With the deadline looming, Woodruff is arguably the most fascinating player to watch today. He has been an excellent pitcher for Milwaukee in recent years, having made 103 starts from 2019 to the present with a 2.93 earned run average. He struck out 30% of batters faced in that time while giving out walks at just a 6.3% clip. The 15.1 wins above replacement he produced in that stretch, per FanGraphs, was 15th among all major league pitchers. He can be retained for one more season via arbitration but the situation is complicated by a shoulder injury. The righty mi sed part of the 2023 campaign due to a subscapular strain in his right shoulder, making just 11 starts, and wasnt able to appear in the playoffs. Last month, the club announced that he would require surgery to repair the anterior capsule in his right shoulder, which would keep him out of action for most or perhaps all of 2024. Woodruff himself later the situation and put a bit more of an optimistic spin on it, suggesting its po sible hes back by midseason, but hes a real wild card at the moment. Woodruff had a salary of $10.8MM in 2023 and MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects him for a raise to $11.6MM next year. Although Woodruff is incredibly talented, that could be a lot of money for a low-spending club like T.J. Warren Jersey the Brewers to give out for a guy who is such an unknown right now. On the positive end of things, Woodruff could return for the second half and be his old self, helping the team for a postseason push. That would be a huge boost to a rotation that currently is fronted by and with plenty of question marks beyond that, and Burnes himself is a trade candidate given that he also has just one year of expensive arb control remaining. If that were to come to pa s, Woodruff would be a lock to receive and reject a qualifying offer, thus netting the Brewers an extra draft pick. But its also po sible that the injury timeline goes beyond expectations and Woodruff doesnt come back, or perhaps he does return but hes not as effective as before. In that case, justifying a qualifying offer would be harder and he could perhaps depart for nothing. Given that po sible downside, its po sible the club might have to consider a strict non-tender. The club has had payrolls around $120-130MM in recent years, per , so committing almost 10% of their budget to a guy who might not pitch at all next year would certainly be risky. Other clubs with more financial wiggle room might have a greater appetite for taking that bet so its understandable that the Brewers would try to get a sense of what other options are available. The deadline doesnt nece sarily mean that a trade has to happen today. The Brewers could agree to tender Woodruff a contract and then trade him at a later date. But the talks should at least give them some perspective on whether thats an advisable path to take or not. If they dont find any offers that are particularly appealing, then maybe they simply decide to bite the bullet on a non-tender. That would result in Woodruff departing for nothing and becoming a free agent, but they could at least use the saved money on upgrading the roster with some other player or players. With the deadline now just a few hours away, the situation should have more clarity by the time today is done. Malcolm Brogdon Jersey